Patricia Reilly Giff has recieved the Newbery Honor for Pictures of Hollis Woods and Lily's Crossing, which is also a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book. Nory Ryan's Song was named an ALA Best Book for Young Adults and an ALA Notable Book.
Blanche Sims is a children's book illustrator, born in Cleveland, Ohio. She has illustrated dozens of books, as well as the television film Beyond the Butterfly, which won a Parents' Choice Foundation commendation for television in 2000.

Emily is stuck with crybaby Jill Simon as her "secret Pal" to be kind to for the whole month of December.